This article highlights the recent findings and novel conclusions drawn from various medical studies that point to a deficiency in our parasympathetic (rest & digest) nervous system, rather than blockages in the coronary arteries, as the primary cause of heart disease and fatal heart attacks. Properly engineered brainwave entrainment technology can be one of the most effective and effortless ways to re-engage our parasympathetic relaxation response.
The Heart Care Solution™
What if you could make one simple adjustment to your daily routine to help minimize the risk of heart disease and suffering a fatal heart attack?
It has long been the established view of the medical profession that the primary cause of heart disease is the buildup of plaque in one or more of the four coronary arteries that supply blood to the heart. Specifically, as the plaque formations build up and the arterial pathways harden and narrow to a significant degree, the theory goes that blood flow to the heart becomes partially or in some cases fully restricted and will lead to heart pain (angina) and eventually a minor or in many cases fatal heart attack (medically known as ‘myocardial infarction’). Consequently, various medical procedures such as stents, angioplasties and coronary bypasses are widely used to address this arterial insufficiency. In addition, cholesterol has traditionally been viewed as one of the main culprits that led to plaque formation and hence there is even more widespread prescription of ‘statin’ drugs, which act to block the absorption of cholesterol in the body.
Recently, a number of medical practitioners have started to shed doubt on this established ‘coronary’ view as to the primary cause of heart disease, including the excellent work of Dr Knut Sroka (see heartattacknew.com) and Dr Thomas Cowan (see fourfoldhealing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Cowan-reprint.pdf). Both conclude that the real cause lies in dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system’s control of the heart itself, as we will see below.
Dr Sroka in particular provides compelling evidence accumulated from various studies that demonstrate how the conventional ‘coronary’ view is misleading. He shows video footage of angiograms (where dye is injected upstream in the coronary arteries to highlight blockages) that show even in the case of a severely blocked artery, the dye still reaches downstream due to the fact that compensatory blood vessels develop around the site of the blockage. This point is really significant to note – your body has a natural bypass system using collateralized blood vessels to ensure blood flow still reaches the heart.
In two significant studies of the autopsies of fatal heart attack victims, less than half of the cases showed sufficient thrombosis (ie blood clots) to explain the fatal heart attack. However even in those cases the pathology reports show that thrombosis is more likely to have developed as a result of the heart attack, rather than leading up to it. Furthermore, if the conventional theory holds true then as the coronary blockages restrict blood flow to the heart, you would expect to find a significant decrease in oxygen levels within the heart cells. Dr Cowan notes that in fact this does not occur at all and that in just about every instance, the oxygen levels do not change at all throughout the entire heart attack process. Both conclude that while plaque buildup in one or more of the four coronary arteries is undesirable, it is not the primary cause of heart disease and fatal heart attacks. (If you are in any doubt as to this challenge to the conventional view, we encourage you to review in more detail the compelling evidence of Dr Sroka and Dr Cowan using the above links.)
So if the coronary blockage model does not adequately explain how heart attacks occur then what does?
The revolution in our understanding of what really causes heart disease
Both Dr Stoka and Dr Cowan state that the real cause of heart attacks is dysfunction of the ‘autonomic nervous system’, which controls the function of our internal organs including our hearts. The autonomic nervous system consists of two branches – the sympathetic nervous system, known as the ‘fight or flight’ system; and the parasympathetic nervous system, known as the ‘rest and digest’ system. The two systems should work together in a healthy balance to control heart rate variability (HRV), so that the body is able to respond to a variety of physically or mentally stressful situations and then adequately recover. It is this ability to recover and switch back to a natural rest and digest mode that holds the key.
Dr Cowan points out how medical researchers have shown in multiple studies that patients with heart disease have an average decrease of over 33% in parasympathetic activity and, furthermore, that 80% of heart attacks are preceded by a major reduction in parasympathetic activity. Importantly, both he and Dr Sroka state the real cause of heart disease is a significant and sustained decrease in parasympathetic activity followed by a relative increase in sympathetic nervous system activity that the heart is unable to cope with.
The theory goes that when the person is in a state of increased sympathetic activity, usually due to an intense period of emotional or physical stress, the ‘amygdala’ (a key emotional ‘fight or flight’ center in the brain) will stimulate the release of adrenaline from the adrenal medulla gland. This sudden surge of adrenaline directs the heart cells to break down glucose using aerobic glycolysis, rather than the heart’s preferred or primary fuel source of ketones and fat. The consequence and byproduct of this glycolysis is a dramatic increase in lactic acid production occurring in the heart cells. Note that a high level of lactic acid is seen in 100% of heart attack victims. As a result of the increase in lactic acid in the heart cells, a localized acidosis occurs which prevents calcium ions from entering the cells and as a result makes that area of the heart less able to contract. This inability to contract causes swelling of the heart tissue and eventually leads to a heart attack.
Dr Cowan notes that in recent times the proponents of the coronary view of heart attacks point to ‘unstable plaques’ as being the more accurate cause of fatal heart attacks. He notes however that the real reason for unstable plaques being present in autopsies is that the swelling in the heart cells dramatically alters the blood pressure of the arteries embedded in the relevant section of the heart, resulting in such pressure that the unstable plaques rupture.
Throughout the catastrophic chain of events described above, the real issue is that the typical victim at risk of a heart attack has an insufficient parasympathetic response to counter-balance the effects of excess adrenaline production and the excessive glycolysis that occurs.
So what causes insufficiency in the parasympathetic nervous system?
Rather unsurprisingly it’s our modern lifestyle that leads to chronic insufficiency in our parasympathetic nervous systems. In particular, chronic stress & anxiety, poor sleeping patterns, a diet high in processed foods with excess sugar and the wrong kind of fat (trans-fatty acids), smoking, drinking, hypertension, too little of the right kinds of exercise and ineffective relaxation can all weaken our parasympathetic response and hence lead to autonomic nervous system imbalance over time.
It’s important for the simple solution described below to understand in more detail the nature of the parasympathetic nervous system. The parasympathetic nerve supply to the heart is supplied by the vagus nerve, which originates in the brainstem and connects into two areas within the heart. See the red line (not the purple line) in the diagram to the right. The vagus nerve slows and relaxes your heart, whereas the sympathetic nerve branches accelerate and constricts it. When you shift into a parasympathetic state for a sustained period of time, you don’t just simply relax; your neurochemistry fundamentally changes. Not only does your heart rate slow, but your adrenaline and cortisol levels drop (stress hormones) and you produce more of the three key parasympathetic neurotransmitters – nitric oxide, acetyl choline and cyclic guanosine monophosphate.
The various lifestyle and dietary factors above can decrease your parasympathetic response over time to the point where it is not adequately counter-balancing your sympathetic nervous system. This puts you at a much higher risk when exposed to a significantly stressful event. In the past few years alone, studies have shown that those of us who are regularly stressed have a five-fold increased risk of dying from heart-related problems. Six-Year Risk of All-Cause and Cardiovascular Mortality, The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (2010), vol 95(11), pp 4959-4964.
While it may not come as a surprise to you what causes this parasympathetic deficiency over time, what may be a surprise is how simple yet essential it is to take matters into your own hands right now, rather than just rely on surgical intervention and a cocktail of pharmaceutical medicines. (Just to be clear, we are not suggesting you disregard the coronary artery model and the advice of a cardiologist altogether. What we are saying is how vital it is to focus your efforts on improving your parasympathetic response as a complementary strategy.)
Brainwaves as the key to restoring your parasympathetic balance
The question you need to be asking yourselves based on the above information is: what is the most effective way to restore my parasympathetic (rest & digest) response?
In our clearly biased view, ‘properly engineered’ brainwave entrainment technology holds the key! If you aren’t too familiar with your brainwaves, the term is used to refer to the billions of neurons in your brain that transmit action potentials down their axons to the synapses where they trigger the release of neurotransmitters (including those key neurotransmitters stimulated by the parasympathetic response). These action potentials are essentially electrical charges that are passed from neuron to neuron. By placing sensors on the scalp through the use of electroencephalograph technology (an EEG machine), researchers can detect not the individual firings of neurons—they are far too small and numerous to differentiate—but the sum total of this electrical activity, dubbed ‘brainwaves’ for their cyclical nature.
One of the problems with modern society is that we tend to ‘drive’ our minds in such a way that our brainwaves remain in a varied ‘beta’ state of high frequency activity. We live in a continually stressed out state of what we refer to as “beta frazzle”. Most people tend to rush around, think too much, multi-task and frequently overload their minds with stressful thoughts. if you are continually stuck in this beta frazzle, it makes it very hard to relax properly and access more of the vitally important parasympathetic neurotransmitters.
The real value of properly engineered brainwave entrainment technology is that it provides an ‘access point’ to your cognitive functioning that allows you to shift your brainwave patterns by listening to a specific audio frequency and hence, for this purpose, create a strong parasympathetic relaxation response throughout your body.
The problem with standard relaxation techniques
By definition, most people at high risk of heart attack do not get sufficient parasympathetic relaxation. More often than not, the typical male or female will have to deal with the various daily stresses and strains of modern life and then comes home and tends to obligations around the house or attempts to relax by watching tv. Depending on the intensity of what he or she watches – a sports game or some crime drama – this can actually make matters worse by continuing to stimulate the sympathetic/fight or flight nervous system.
To effectively relax, many practitioners will recommend activities like meditation or yoga. The problem with standard meditation techniques is that they require a lot of disciplined effort and can take anywhere from three weeks to several months or more to get to grips with. This can be counter-productive as it’s often really frustrating and stressful trying to sit there and still your mind for 30 minutes at a time. A lot of men also find the stigma of meditation or yoga classes off-putting and hence never really get proper parasympathetic relaxation on a daily basis.
Properly engineered brainwave entrainment technology on the other hand is one of the most effective ways to shift out of a stressed ‘fight or flight’ state and into deep relaxation – the beauty lies in its effortlessness. All you need to do is sit back in a comfortable chair, put on a pair of over-the-ear headphones and listen.
The Heart Care Solution™ – key steps
The Neural Agility track off our RevitaMind product is ideal for activating your parasympathetic response. It provides a consistent pulsed tone stimulus that is designed to take your brain wave patterns gently down to a specific frequency within the ‘theta’ range that is known to provide deep relaxation and stimulate certain neurotransmitters associated with the parasympathetic state, such as acetylcholine. Furthermore, the added benefit of listening to Neural Agility is that it is primarily designed to support your cognitive function – another issue that we all worry about as we age.
There are three simple steps you can carry out while listening to the audio track:
- Simply put the headphones on, lie back in a comfortable recliner chair or on a bed, close your eyes and listen at a comfortably loud volume. Ensure you have an ‘accepting’ frame of mind to the unique sounding pulsed tones. Allow your breathing to relax and slow down as much as possible as you continue to listen. Breathe in and out effortlessly through your nose and ensure you are breathing from the base of your rib cage (your diaphragm) and not from your upper chest area. To really help relax, you could then imagine walking into an elevator and imagine your favorite chair is there and you sit down on it. Imagine you are at level 10 and that you click on the ground floor button and then very slowly count down from 10 to zero as you feel yourself descending and relaxing more and more. Allow all your stresses and issues to disappear as you descend through each level.
- The first step above will provide you with sufficient parasympathetic stimulation each day. However to compound the heart benefits, you may then wish to spend a few minutes carrying out the following technique from the excellent HeartMath Institute while continuing to listen to the Neural Agility track. If you haven’t come across the HeartMath Institute it is well worth checking out the organization’s website and books. One very simple exercise is to focus your attention on your heart area in the center of your chest. Now imagine your breath is actually flowing in and out from that area. As you breathe in and out of your heart area, recall a positive emotion and re-experience it while listening. For example, recall the loving feeling of playing with a family pet, or enjoying the most relaxing holiday you’ve been on, or a time when you truly felt at peace with the world. Continue to feel that specific feeling as physically as possible while breathing and listening to the track. A workplace study of employees with hypertension found that after three months of practicing this HeartMath tool, blood pressure dropped an average 10.6 mm Hg for systolic and 6.3 mm Hg for diastolic. (Source: Impact of workplace stress reduction program on blood pressure and emotional health in hypertensive employees, Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine (2003), vol 9(3), pp 355-369.)
- A third and final step while still listening to the Neural Agility track is to next visualize in your mind the vagus nerve shown in the diagram above. Imagine it to be a cable coming down from the base of your brain and connecting into your heart. Now imagine this cable has a healthy blue or green color (whatever you prefer) and as you breathe in and out through your nose into your heart center in your chest, imagine the cable strengthening and growing in thickness. Imagine that your heart slows and relaxes as you do this. Carry this out for a couple of minutes each time you listen to the track. Your mind can have a powerful effect on your autonomic nervous system and physiology when you practice such activities consistently.
Depending on the state of your health and lifestyle, it’s important to listen to Neural Agility every night while performing the above steps. Ideally listen just before bed as it will provide the added benefit of ensuring you relax properly and therefore get the most restorative sleep. Note that there is no correct way to carry out the above steps, so don’t worry if you’re not sure you’re doing it right. Feel free to adapt the visualizations in the above three steps in a way that best works for you.
Lastly, you can take added comfort that through the principle of ‘neuroplasticity’ the more you listen to this Neural Agility track while performing the visualization, the more you will develop neural pathways that will strengthen this parasympathetic circuit and hence the benefits you will receive.
What other factors are vital to supporting your situation?
Listening to our Neural Agility track while carrying out the above steps will go a long way to improving your parasympathetic response and we recommend this as the primary measure to get better control of your health. There are a few other factors that will help optimize your parasympathetic response and good health.
Supplements: Generally we like to recommend as few supplements as possible. While the following have been recommended for years as beneficial for coronary health, what is most interesting is when you look a little deeper at the medical studies; they have been shown to improve the parasympathetic response. With these and any other supplements you may consider taking, it’s always important to discuss them with your medical doctor in the event of any conflicts with prescription drugs you may already be taking:
- Nitric oxide production and grape seed extract – one of the most important steps you can take in addition to the above is to ensure you optimize your nitric oxide levels in your body. Remember nitric oxide is one of the primary parasympathetic neurotransmitters and also acts to improve blood flow along your cardio vascular system. Grape seed extract has been found in studies to act as a catalyst by boosting nitric oxide synthase levels. It will work synergistically with the amino acid l-arginine, which you can get in your normal diet by ensuring you eat sufficient nuts, seeds, peanut butter and eggs.
- Fish oil (EPA & DHA) – Many practitioners recommend omega 3 fish oil as being highly beneficial for cardio-vascular health. One study noted that dietary supplementation with DHA-rich fish oil reduced heart rate and modulated heart rate variability in keeping with an improved parasympathetic-sympathetic balance in overweight adults with risk factors for future coronary disease. (Br J Nutr. 2008 Nov;100(5):1097-103.) Ideally you will get three or more servings of oily fish such as salmon, sardines and mackerel every week. If not, then ask your local health store for a very high quality fish oil supplement and store it in the fridge to minimize oxidation.
- Vitamin C – Many doctors and other health practitioners have argued about the benefits of vitamin C for decades and what dosage is too high or too low. In our view the benefits of a moderate dosage of vitamin C are too important to overlook for both heart health and general immunity. One recent study with vitamin C supplementation noted that “the results indicate that acute administration of vitamin C is able to reduce cardiovascular adrenergic drive in hypertensive patients, which suggests that oxidative stress is involved in the regulation of sympathetic activity in essential hypertension.” (Am J Clin Nutr August 2012 vol. 96 no. 2 302-308).
- Magnesium – Magnesium is essential for a whole raft of chemical processes in the body, including helping to relax muscle tissues. Interestingly, most people do not get sufficient magnesium from their diets, unless you happen to eat a lot of green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale. One recent study noted the benefits of magnesium in subjects who had high blood pressure (a key sign of parasympathetic deficiency). It was observed that “there was greater blood pressure reduction in crossover trials, which means when people with high blood pressure were not on magnesium, their blood pressure was higher; when they were on magnesium their blood pressure was lower.” Kass L, Weekes J, Carpenter L. Effect of magnesium supplementation on blood pressure: a meta-analysis. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2012 Feb 8.
Food and dietary guidelines: There has been a lot of controversy in the last decade over what diet is good for you and whether fat is good or bad, whether grains are good or bad etc. Our recommendation is to eat a balanced diet of natural, unprocessed foods and avoid three things: 1. Refined sugar and any product containing it (particularly high fructose corn syrup); 2. Processed, packaged foods (the modern American grocery diet); and 3. trans-fatty acids (found in doughnuts, baked goods including cakes, pie crusts, biscuits, frozen pizza, cookies, crackers, and stick margarines and other spreads).
Instead plan out a diet that predominantly consists of vegetables, some whole grains, some animal fats (including a little butter, whole milk and free-range meat), oily fish, eggs and some fruit. One food we would like to highlight which has received a bad rap over the years (due to previous misconceptions about cholesterol) is the humble egg. The latest thinking is that the sulfur contained in eggs (specifically cholesterol sulfate) is actually vital for your heart function (see the work of the health research scientist Stephanie Seneff). Egg yolks are also one of the highest dietary sources of choline, which is a precursor to the parasympathetic neurotransmitter acetyl-choline. Having a boiled egg each day can actually be very good for your heart.
Exercise and nose breathing: Lastly, exercise is vital for your heart and improving your parasympathetic function, but it’s important that you don’t overdo it if you are at high risk of heart disease. Specifically, you don’t want to push yourself to the extent that you need to over-breathe or hyperventilate through your mouth rather than comfortably through your nose. Many people who are unfit and overweight will think they have to jump on a treadmill or exercycle and slog it out. More often than not you will notice they are ‘heavy breathing’ through their mouths and in this way can actually be over-stimulating their sympathetic nervous systems. Aim for 45 minutes to an hour of brisk walking, swimming, or gym work every day where you are just pushing yourself to the extent that you can still breathe through your nose from your diaphragm and don’t hyperventilate through your mouth.
The information contained in this article could be of real interest to your friends or family. Please feel free to share it with them. However, please note we are not medical professionals and this information is not intended to replace your primary medical care from a qualified medical physician.